Second round of Russia-Ukraine talks ends after just an hour

The second round of direct negotiations between delegations from Russia and Ukraine came to an end in Istanbul on Monday after a little over an hour, Russian state-affiliated news agency Interfax has reported.

This means the talks lasted only half as long as the first round of negotiations between the two sides, which were held in Istanbul last month, Interfax noted. On that occasion, no great breakthrough was reached, though both delegations agreed to release 1,000 prisoners of war each, the largest such swap since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

The fresh round of talks, which were due to start in the city’s Çırağan Palace at 1pm local time, were delayed by over an hour after the head of the Ukrainian delegation, Defence Minister Rustem Umerov, first met with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.

According to the BBC, the Ukrainian delegation handed its Russian counterparts a list of the names of Ukrainian minors who had been forcibly removed from the country since the start of the war.

Russia’s state-owned news agency TASS said that the talks would not resume on Monday, with the Russian delegation due to fly home immediately, with no information yet as to when a third round of talks might be held.

As in the previous round, the Russian delegation was led by presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky, while the Ukrainian delegation was headed by Defence Minister Rustem Umerov.

A source told TASS on Sunday that the Russian delegation was in a “working mood regardless of what’s happening in the background”, possibly alluding to the Ukrainian drone strike that destroyed over 40 Russian military aircraft deep inside Russian territory over the weekend, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said would be written about “in history books”.

Medinsky, who reportedly told the Ukrainian delegation during the previous round of talks that Russia was prepared to fight the war “forever”, and threatened to seize the northeastern region of Sumy and the eastern Kharkiv region, said on Monday that Russia had received Ukraine’s draft memorandum for a peace accord, but did not disclose its contents, saying only that it had been written in Ukrainian and English.

“It’s all right, we made it through. There are people in our delegation who speak all sorts of different languages,” Medinsky told propaganda outlet RT.

According to Kyiv’s roadmap for peace, a copy of which was seen by Reuters, Ukraine sees the current location of the frontline as “the starting point for negotiations about territory”, demanding a full ceasefire for at least 30 days, the return of all prisoners held by each side, and a direct meeting between Zelensky and Vladimir Putin.

According to Reuters, Kyiv’s proposals also include no restrictions on Ukraine’s military strength and no international recognition of Ukrainian territory currently occupied by Russia, which is bound to go against Russia’s terms for peace.

Although Moscow has not yet made the contents of its memorandum publicly available, sources in the Ukrainian delegation called the demands made during the previous round of talks “detached from reality”, claiming they went “far beyond” anything previously discussed, including “non-starters” such as ultimatums for Ukraine to withdraw from parts of its own territory in order to obtain a ceasefire.